Monday, November 30, 2015

Turkish PM: No apology for Russian jet downing

Turkey's prime minister has said his country will not apologize to Russia for shooting down a warplane operating over Syria that crossed into Turkish airspace.

"No Turkish prime minister or president will apologize because of doing our duty.

"Protection of Turkish airspace, Turkish borders is a national duty, and our army did their job to protect this airspace. But if the Russian side wants to talk, and wants to prevent any future unintentional events like this, we are ready to talk," Davutoglu said.

Russia has been attacking rebel forces allied or aligned with Turkey, true, but shooting down an aircraft crosses a line. Turkey would have been better advised to talk to the Russians and work out some kind of mutually acceptable compromise.

Turkey's Islamist government stands accused of protecting Islamist elements inside Syria who are, if not ISIS, at least aligned with ISIS.

Russia's newly declared economic war against Turkey and its introduction of provocative new S-400 anti-aircraft weaponry into the region that can take down Turkish F-16s are a far higher price than Erdogan expected to pay.

You may not like Putin and his assertive foreign policy -- I don't like his friendship with Iran and other dodgy players -- but you have to take him seriously.